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Big brands band together on internet security

SHANE MCLEOD: Some of the world's biggest internet companies have kicked off a campaign calling on the US government to restore people's trust in technology after the revelations of former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden.

In an open letter, Microsoft, Google, Apple, Facebook and others have called on the president Barack Obama and the US Congress to tighten controls on the collection of personal data.

As Michael Vincent reports from Washington, the President says he does intend to propose reforms to the NSA.

MICHAEL VINCENT: Some of the biggest brands on the planet are flexing their muscle. The list of companies putting their name to this open letter reads like the board of the NASDAQ: Yahoo, LinkedIn, AOL, Twitter among the eight.

Google's CEO Larry Page says his company's investment in encryption and security has been undone by the apparent wholesale collection of data.

The group wants the US and other governments to be more transparent.

Cybersecurity specialist Dr James Andrew Lewis is sympathetic to a point.

ANDREW LEWIS: Well the Snowden story has been really unfair to the companies because it makes it seem like they were witting participants. And of course they had no more idea of what was going on than anyone else. And so they've got to come out and say something, mainly to protect their market share but also because a lot of them feel this way. I mean, they are from California and they think government shouldn't be spying on folks.

MICHAEL VINCENT: Now the director of the Technology and Public Policy Program at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, Dr Lewis previously worked for the US Departments of State and Commerce and from 2007 to 2011 he was on president Obama's Commission on Cybersecurity.

ANDREW LEWIS: I know the administration is working on a response to the European Commission which has come in with all these requests for transparency and restrictions. So you will see an effort to rebuild trust. You will see an effort to make people feel comfortable with the fact that in a dangerous world you're going to have to collect intelligence. But that can be done in a way that protects civil liberties.

MICHAEL VINCENT: The Google chief executive Larry Page has gone on to say in this campaign that's launched its own website, that the users' data, the security of users' data is critical. And so they're going to invest even more in encryption and fighting for transparency and essentially if governments are going to want this information they're going to have to get it through very open means like, well as open a means as they can.

ANDREW LEWIS: I think that's great and I hope that the same rules apply to Russia and China and Iran and countries like that. I mean, this is a global network. And it would be silly if all we did as a result of this was make democracy less safe and dictators safer.

So sure, sounds great. Let's have everybody do it.

MICHAEL VINCENT: But as you've said, you don't think anyone should, even if they do get the encryption right, provide a service which was completely private and unbreakable.

ANDREW LEWIS: You know we limit the right of people to sell guns and explosives and bombs and you know, information can be a weapon too. So somebody has to make that call. If the processes we have in place don't create the amount of trust we need, that means change the processes, it means don't give up safety.

MICHAEL VINCENT: The companies have asked for in this letter that they be at least be allowed to publish the number of times and the nature of the request for information about their users.

ANDREW LEWIS: I think that's great. I mean, the point of a democracy is you have transparency and you have debate. So increasing transparency is going to be something that all governments will ultimately need to do. There's always a balance between being transparent and being effective when it comes to security. But we need to be more transparent.

MICHAEL VINCENT: Dr Lewis says the US shouldn't be singled out. He says the full list of the countries that have asked for data or have taken data from the major internet companies should be released. He says then people would be surprised.